While China‟s markets may be stretched right now and looking ripe for an early cycle correction, this is a dip that you should buy into. As the chart above shows, the liquidity environment remains extremely supportive.
While the argument that liquidity drives stock markets in China and Hong Kong may already be consensus to some extent, so is the view that economic growth will strengthen next year. This would trigger two things. 1) A tightening response from central banks eager to restore monetary conditions to normal; 2) a de-facto tightening resulting from the withdrawal of free liquidity because of demand from recovering real economies. Both of those would be bearish and would trigger a mid-cycle correction in stock markets which have rallied hard this year relative to earnings forecasts which are normalizing more slowly.
However, we take the view that China faces continued weak external demand in 2010 and that monetary conditions will remain loose. Free liquidity will continue to have positive effects on financial assets and the Hong Kong and China stock markets over the next twelve months.
We like the property and banks sectors in China and Hong Kong as plays on the domestic consumption and reflation themes.